DENVER – The Colorado Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments in two cases at Northeastern Junior College on Thursday, March 22, 2018, before an audience of high school and college students. The public also is invited to attend.

The visit is part of the Colorado Judicial Branch’s Courts in the Community, an outreach program the Colorado Supreme Court and Court of Appeals initiated on Law Day (May 1), 1986. The Courts in the Community program was developed to give Colorado high school students insight into the Colorado judicial system and illustrate how disputes are resolved in a democratic society. These are not mock proceedings. The court will hear arguments in actual cases from which it will issue opinions. The court generally issues opinions within a few weeks of the arguments.

The 22 judges of the Colorado Court of Appeals sit in divisions of three judges to hear cases. Judges hearing cases at Sterling High School are David Furman, Terry Fox and Karen M. Ashby.

The two cases are:

17CA0737, Jose A. Miranda v. EWV, LLC: Jose and Silvia Miranda entered into a contract with EWV, LLC in April 2014 to buy EWV’s right, title and interest in 64 mobile homes abandoned at a mobile-home park in Evans, Colo., after a catastrophic flood a year earlier. The contract required the Mirandas to remove the mobile homes from the park no later than August 31, 2014, or pay EWV’s costs to remove them. The Mirandas were able to remove 19 mobile homes before the deadline; EWV spent nearly $274,000 to remove the others. The Mirandas later sued EWV for various claims relating to the remaining 45 mobile homes. The trial judge initially granted summary judgment in favor of EWV but later granted summary judgment in favor of the Mirandas, finding the contract was void because it would have required the Mirandas to engage in illegal acts (moving mobile homes without having certificates of title) and failed to provide the Mirandas with any consideration, or thing of value. EWV asked the Colorado Court of Appeals to review the case and send it back to a new trial court judge for enforcement of the contract because, in EWV’s opinion, the judge who previously heard the case has predetermined the issue and would be unable to conduct a fair hearing.

14CA1225, People of the State of Colorado v. Jamale D. Townsell: Jamale Townsell has asked the Colorado Court of Appeals to review his convictions and 32-year prison sentence for charges stemming from a 2013 bank robbery in Aurora. Mr. Townsell argues the trial court made errors that deprived him of his constitutional right to a fair trial. Among the claimed errors were the trial court’s decision to allow prosecutors to introduce DNA evidence and its failure to declare a mistrial after a witness testified that Mr. Townsell had been in jail a few years earlier. Prosecutors argued in their briefs the DNA evidence was properly admitted and that the witness’ testimony about Mr. Townsell’s jail term came up during questioning by the defense attorney. Mr. Townsell also argues that a police officer should not have been allowed to testify about a witness’ statements immediately after the robbery; prosecutors said the officer’s testimony was allowed under an exception to rules against allowing hearsay evidence. Mr. Townsell also argued in his briefs that the trial judge improperly ordered that sentences on two counts of aggravated robbery would run consecutively instead of simultaneously, while prosecutors said in their brief that the sentence was proper.

The proceedings will begin at 10 a.m. Thursday, March 22, 2018, at Northeastern Junior College, E.S. French Hall, 100 College Ave., Sterling, CO 80751. A question-and-answer session, during which the students may ask questions of the attorneys, will follow the arguments in each case. At the conclusion of the second argument, the students also will have the opportunity to participate in a question-and-answer session with the Court of Appeals judges.